In her 10 years at Education Week, Catherine Gewertz has written primarily about urban education. She concentrates on the world of secondary schools, with a particular focus on the transitions into and out of high school.

Middle and High Schools Push for More Title I Aid

The National Association of Secondary School Principals is urging folks in the middle and high school world to let their senators know that those schools deserve a bigger share of the Title I pie.

In an e-mail alert sent out today, the NASSP notes a recent U.S. Department of Education assessment of Title I that found that middle and high schools get less Title I money than their respective shares of the low-income student population would suggest they should (14 percent of Title I goes to middle schools, though they enroll 20 percent of the low-income student population, and 10 percent goes to high schools, which enroll 22 percent).

The alert went out today because a U.S. Senate committee is hashing out its version of the fiscal 2010 education spending bill, including a proposed $1.5 billion for School Improvement Grants under Title I, and its attendant requirement that at least 40 percent of that money be tagged for middle and high schools.

The President's proposal to shift $1 billion to the Title I school improvement program from the Title I grants to districts didn't go over real well on the House side. (See our Politics K-12 blog posts here and here.) Now it's in the hands of the Senate.

My former colleague, David Hoff, first reported on this 40 percent idea back in March. (He's gone on to a job at the Ed Department now, but his blog archive lives on!) Alyson Klein's story about Obama's budget proposal in May mentions it as well.

The Alliance for Excellent Education released a statement earlier this month urging funding of this provision.

For those of you who like to curl up with a nice federal budget summary, the proposed 40 percent requirement is mentioned here, too.

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